“Ye are Mrs. Andrews,” he said. He turned to Ewen and Paterson. “She is Mrs. Andrews.”
Ewen grinned and shrugged. “Mrs. Andrews.”
Paterson narrowed his eyes and grunted. “Aye.”
Arabella laced her fingers with Alasdair’s. “Thank you.”
Just then, the lodgekeeper came back into the room with a tray laden with a teapot and cups and saucers and set it down on a table. He went to the hob and took down the kettle and filled the teapot with steaming water.
“I’ll make sandwiches. And when this has steeped long enough, will you do me the honor of pouring, miss?”
“Missus,” Alastair said, his voice suddenly deeper at finding himself a married man. “Mrs. Andrews. And I am Dr. Andrews.”
The lodgekeeper looked at him for a moment and then turned back to Arabella. “I am Farley, and I beg your pardon, Mrs. Andrews, but will you pour? I’m afraid the spout does drip a bit. And I’ll go find some sugar.”
“Yes,” Arabella said and went to the table.
How graceful she is, my wife.
“My husband does like sugar in his tea,” she called after Farley who was disappearing into another room. She gave Alasdair a small smile. A wistful smile, not a mischievous one, and he longed to go to her and kiss her and comfort her. And he wanted to know the source of her distress so he could banish it.
When she brought Alasdair his cup of tea, he could see that she was shaking and he could hear a fine rattle of the cup in the saucer.
“Ye must tell me why ye are so altered, so upset,” he said in the quietest voice he could manage. “Why ye want this pretense.”
She looked around them and so he did, too. The lodgekeeper Farley was out of the room, perhaps back in the place that must be the kitchen. Ewen was sitting a good distance away, gulping his tea, and Paterson was looking out the far window at the gusting snow, holding his teacup to his lips and blowing on it.
“You must never tell my stepfather or your friend Thomas or my other brother-in-law, the viscount. Or anyone else,” she said softly, looking down.
He nodded.
“Lord Morpeth is the man ... He is the reason I left London, two years ago.”
Her eyes met his.
Five seconds went by as Alasdair came to realize what she meant. And then he pulled her down next to him on the bench and held her wrist tightly. And then another minute passed as he grappled with what she had said.
For the last two years, he had told himself that the incident for him was only important in that it was the thing that had driven her away from her family. And because she had been hurt by it. And in the carriage, he had meant it when he told her that she was not ruined. She wasn’t. In a way, wasn’t she even more magnificent than ever? To go and start a school in Dunburn. She would have never conceived of such a thing if she had stayed in London. And, of course, if she had stayed in London, she would likely be married to a duke of her own by now and would have been forever out of his reach.
But now, suddenly, the incident—her deflowering—seemed to have a great deal to do with him. With his self-respect. His place in the world. His merit. Because she washis, now. Well, if nothisquite, certainly well on her way to becominghis.
He flashed on Boyd in the public house in Dunburn.
Aye. He agreed with Boyd.
He, Alasdair, was going to beat this fellow bloody. Not for Arabella. But for himself, selfishly. And for Boyd, for all the men in the world who loved sweet women who had been hurt by other men.
She seemed to read his mind.
“You must do nothing to him.” Her mouth was on his ear. “Do not let Lord Morpeth provoke you. We will stay until the road is clear and then we will go. That is all I want. That we leave this place, together.”
He gripped her wrist more tightly. He was still wordless.
“You’re hurting me, Alasdair.”
He came to himself then and released her immediately. He looked down and indeed her wrist was red and showed the marks of his fingers. He turned to her.
“Forgive me, please,” he murmured.
